Cadillac Team Manager Crolla on Building F1's Newest Team from Scratch

Peter Crolla knows exactly what it takes to build an F1 team from nothing. After spending over nine years helping bring Haas to life in 2016, he traded stability for another startup challenge, joining Cadillac as race team manager to assemble its trackside operation from an empty building ahead of the 2026 season. Now deep into Cadillac's debut campaign, the squad is enduring the expected early bruises while pushing to establish itself beyond simply making the grid.

Why it matters:

New entries are virtually unheard of in modern Formula 1, and the margin for error is slim. Crolla's experience provides a vital blueprint for avoiding the trap of starting small, a lesson he learned from watching the sport's demands explode since the Haas days. As the team works through reliability niggles and operational growing pains this season, the nine-month foundation he laid is being judged against rivals packing decades of institutional muscle.

The details:

• Crolla joined in April 2025 with a three-pillar mandate: respectable participation, reliability, and performance. Cadillac hit its winter testing and Melbourne targets, but Austria and other rounds have exposed the harsh reality of debut-season logistics.
• Recruitment was a race against the calendar itself, with many candidates locked behind three-to-six-month gardening leave. New hires arrived through late 2025 and were thrown straight into the fire—sorting equipment, building cars, and rehearsing pit stops without a grace period.
• Staff drawn from Mercedes, Ferrari, and other top outfits bought into the startup mentality. Crolla leaned on trusted suppliers and gave his team the authority to shape bespoke procedures rather than copy legacy workflows from established garages.
• The team currently works from Silverstone while a new U.S. headquarters in Fishers, Indiana, prepares to open in 2027. The UK facility is expanding as the operation outgrows its original skeleton crew structure.

What's next:

Marcin Budkowski has since taken the reins as team principal following Graeme Lowdon's departure, adding another layer of transition during a critical growth phase. Crolla insists the project is only getting started, arguing that Cadillac's true scale will only become clear once both sides of the Atlantic are fully operational. For now, the immediate target is turning those hard-earned early lessons into steady, measurable progress up the grid.